Gil Asakawa's Nikkei View | All Posts
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July 8, 2007

For most people -- but I think especially for Japanese Americans, who tend to come from very defined communities bound together by geographic roots, generational branchings and, for many, the shared trauma of internment -- meeting a stranger and finding out you're somehow related isn't such a big deal. It might be novel, or surprising, but it's probably not a life-changing fact. My wife Erin and I joke that in Denver, there are only a few Japanese families, and that everyone's related, if not by blood then certainly by marriage. She plays the "six degrees of separation" game all the time when she meets a JA, and invariably finds that they have friends or family in common. For Erin, whose nuclear family all live in the area as well as a huge number of extended family members, funerals and holidays are like frequent family reunions. Not me. My family has always lived in a community and family vacuum -- an isolation chamber devoid of contact with relatives. We didn't live within JA communities, didn't grow up attending the Buddhist temple or Methodist church with other JA kids, and seldom saw or made contact with cousins, uncles and aunties. Even when my dad died, it was difficult tracking down the contact information for his brothers and sisters. Certainly, I've never had someone come up to me in Colorado and play "six degrees of separation" to see if we're related. But last weekend, I was in San Jose to attend the bi-annual Youth Conference for the Japanese American Citizens League (the APA civil rights organization for which I'm on the national board). Erin gave a workshop and the closing keynote speech for the conference, and I went to give a book reading and sign copies for the Japanese American Museum of San Jose. That's when my little isolated world was shattered. A young woman came up to me with a copy of my book, "Being Japanese American." She explained she didn't buy it at the reading, but brought it with her. She had moved to California recently from Hawaii, and her mother had sent her the book. And, she added, her mother told her she was related to me. WOW.
July 7, 2007

Two news items worth noting, although one is kinda old already: First Burger King has announced that in Hawaii, they're selling a new item, a Spam Platter -- two slices of Spam nestled between white rice and scrambled eggs. BK, which is based in Miami, also serves its Croissanwich or Biscuit Sandwich with Spam for the Hawaiian market.
June 26, 2007

We spent some time at the Sakura Matsuri, or Cherry Blossom Festival, in downtown Denver's Sakura Square this past weekend. It was a good chance to catch up with old friends and we ended up filling a long table with extended family members. I was there to do a booksigning for a vendor, Heritage Source, a family-run business based out of LA, which sells books online and at events like Sakura Matsuri. Carolyn Sanwo brought her husband and two daughters along to help run the booth all weekend, and I sat there for a few hours on Saturday and chatted with folks and signed copies of "Being Japanese American." Erin spent the time volunteering inside the Tri-State Buddhist Temple's gym, selling manju pastries to the hungry throngs. It was hot but crowded. And, among the crowd were a surprising number of non-Asian kids, dressed in shabby faux-kimonos, looking as if they were homeless urchins. What was I to make of this new trend?
June 26, 2007

Way back in May, I didn't write about it, but I should have. In one week during Asian Pacific American Heritage Month, the character played by Masi Oka in the terrific series "Heroes" helped save the world, Olympic skater Apolo Anton Ohno won the coveted prize in "Dancing with the Stars" and a lovely Chinese American hapa woman, Tessa Horst,...

June 21, 2007

Interesting exercise in nostalgia with irony: KCUV-FM in Denver is celebrating the official kickoff of summer by recreating the sound of Denver's FM radio from 1967, complete with news items, radio commercials from back then, and typical playlsists, all presented by the airstaff of progressive radio from the time, including guys like Bill Clarke (who's on Channel 7 now but...

April 29, 2007

UPDATE April 13, 2009: I went to drop off some shoes with Claude the King of Shoes in advance of an out-of-town trip, and was disappointed to see he wasn't at his usual spot at Welton St. and the 16th Street Mall in Downtown Denver. As I turned to go back to my office, I saw him -- about 75 feet away from the intersection, looking lonely. He told me the Downtown Denver Partnership organization was forcing him to back away from the intersection at least 50 feet, or pay for a vendor's license of over $500 a month. I wondered if he makes that much more than that. Here's a story from the Denver Post. He's also being criticized for making remarks at people (and their shoes) as they walk on by. Today as I waited he commented to a man walking with a woman, "You must the key to heaven... because you have such an angel with you." He got a smile from both the man and woman. He called out to another woman, "I can't imagine the world without your beauty in it." She smiled too. Some people (maybe even me, if I didn't know Claude) might take these comments to be sexist and inappropriate. But in the context of his "act," they seem awful cute to me. It's how he gets peoples' attention to sell his top-quality shoeshines. He's been shining shoes downtown for 14 years, he said, and 11 of those years now, at one intersection: 16th and Welton. He's trying to raise money for a lawyer to help him fight the "eviction" on grounds that it's limiting his ability to make a living, and on freedom of speech ground (it's true -- like me, many people seem to not see him when he's away from the corner, and he can't keep up his nonstop upbeat patter at passersby). I wish him luck. I'm glad he was able to shine my shoes, and also handle the three pairs I dropped off. (The following post was written April 29, 2007; I made the video above about a year later.) OK, I'm feeling sheepish about admitting this. But I signed up this week for a lifetime membership ... to get my shoes shined by Claude, the King of Shoes. I've seen Claude for years. In fact, he's plied his trade on the corners of Denver's downtown 16th Street Mall for nine years. A few weeks ago, as I was hurrying back from lunch to my office a block off the 16th Street Mall, Claude looked up from a customer's wingtips and glanced my way. "Are those "Bjorns?" he asked. Yes, they were, and yes, they look ratty, but I was in a hurry to get back to the office, without acknowledging the question. A few days ago I was out to lunch again and saw Claude on the corner, shining up another customer's shoes, using his fingers to work in some liquid leather conditioner. He looked up again -- I wasn't wearing my Bjorns this time -- and so I asked him if he really recognized my shoes. He remembered me from the Bjorns, for one thing (OK, maybe my beret and Asian face had something to do with that part), but he explained with some patience, like I shouldn't have to ask, that he's seen every brand of shoe that god's put on Earth and he knows what to do to take care of every one of them.
April 22, 2007

I don't watch "American Idol" ("Dancing with the Stars" is enough reality TV for me), but I've been mildly curious about this 17-year-old kid, Sanjaya Malakar, who managed to squeak through week after week of elimination on "AI" with his breathy singing voice, toothy grin and bizarre variety of hairstyles. Well, he finally got voted off the show last week, but over the weekend he got a consolation prize as a guest at the annual White House Press Correspondents' Dinner, a big deal in DC. Malakar interested me because he's Asian American; his parents immigrated from India, and he identifies himself as an Indian American, hoping to be the "next" Indian pop star in the U.S. (was there a previous Indian pop star in the U.S.?). Unfortunately, Indians don't seem to share his enthusiasm for Sanjaya. The Indian media seemed relieved when he lost last week. One South Asian I know pointed out that the name "Sanjaya" went against Indian convention because ending a name with "a" is a female signifier, and though his name should be "Sanjay."
April 19, 2007

It's silly, and I'm a little embarrassed to admit it, but Erin and I are addicted to "Dancing with the Stars" this season. We hadn't watched it at all in the past, but began tuning in because 1) it began during the down time for new episodes of "Heroes" on Monday nights and 2) it features dancer/choreographer Carrie Ann Inaba, who's Japanese American, as one of the judges and 3) this season one of the stars featured in the competition is Olympic speed skater Apolo Anton Ohno, who's also JA.